The Great War: Its Lessons and Its Warnings

By Jesse Collings

The Great War, Its Lessons and Its Warnings, is an overview of the economic condition of Europe after World War I.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Charles River Editors
• Release date: Mar 22, 2018
• ISBN: 9781531288525

Book preview

THE GREAT WAR

..................

Its Lessons and Its Warnings

Jesse Collings

LACONIA PUBLISHERS

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Copyright © 2016 by Jesse Collings

Interior design by Pronoun

Distribution by Pronoun

TABLE OF CONTENTS

THE GREAT WAR

AFTER-WAR EMPLOYMENT

BRITISH AGRICULTURE

HOME MARKET

REMEDIES: FARMING AND FARMERS

TILLAGE versus GRASS

RECLAMATION OF WASTE LANDS

FRANCE

HOLLAND

ZUIDERZEE

GREAT BRITAIN

SCOTLAND

PEAT LAND AND HEATH LAND

PUBLIC LANDS

INTENSIVE CULTIVATION

COLONIZATION AND VILLAGE COMMUNITIES

ECONOMY AND WASTE

SHORTAGE

FINANCIAL

CONCLUSION

APPENDIX I: A FRENCH AGRICULTURIST’S OPINION

APPENDIX II: A NATIONAL AGRICULTURAL POLICY

APPENDIX III: PEASANT PROPRIETORS

APPENDIX IV: AGRICULTURAL LEAFLETS

APPENDIX V: INCREASE IN FOOD PRICES

THE GREAT WAR

ITS LESSONS AND ITS WARNINGS

BY THE

RIGHT HON. JESSE COLLINGS, J.P., M.P.

Author of Land Reform; The Colonization of Rural Britain; President of the Rural League; and Life Member of the Société des Agriculteurs de France.

When clouds are seen, wise men put on their cloaks.

Shakespeare.

WITH FEELINGS OF HOPE

THE AUTHOR INSCRIBES THIS WORK

TO A BRITISH STATESMAN

WHO HAS NOT YET APPEARED—

A STATESMAN WHO,

IN THE SPIRIT OF STEIN AND HARDEN BERG,

AND WITH THEIR COURAGE, WISDOM AND PATRIOTIC FORESIGHT,

WILL SECURE

SUCH LEGISLATION AS WILL REALIZE

THE UNTOLD RICHES WHICH RESIDE UNDEVELOPED

IN THE SOIL OF HIS COUNTRY

THE GREAT WAR

..................

ITS LESSONS AND ITS WARNINGS

THE OBJECT OF THIS LITTLE book is the same as that of the previous publications by the same author. It seeks to awaken the minds of the people to the importance of Agriculture, and to show that that great industry is the only safe basis on which the economy of the nation can rest. It is a difficult task, because during the past two generations or more they have been educated and nurtured on the idea that trade and commerce were the corner-stones of national wealth and prosperity. Agriculture has been a neglected quantity. No serious thought has been bestowed on it by the general public; and successive Governments, during these generations, have treated it as of small account.

The events of the Great War now raging give us many serious warnings, which it would be unwise and may be fatal to leave unheeded. The most serious is that relating to our food supply. We have escaped disaster in that respect, not by any prevision on our own part, but by the blunders of the enemy.

Of the many blunders the Germans have made, the one most vital to themselves is that they allowed their fleet to be bottled up before the war began. After the war broke out it was too late to rectify it, as the vessels could not leave their ports, being held up by the British fleet.

We were bidden by a naval authority to sleep quietly in our beds, with the assurance that our fleet would in time of war completely protect our food-laden ships. This, however, is a delusion, as shown by the British admirals who have spoken on the question, and whose opinions should carry the greatest weight.

At a meeting held at the Royal United Service Institution, Sir Nowell Salmon, Admiral of the Fleet, said: We may hope to a certain extent, but not at the beginning of a war, the trade routes may be kept free; at the commencement of a war I have no doubt they would be very much interfered with. He went on to quote the opinion of the Secretary of Lloyd’s to the following effect: No form of insurance was practical except keeping up a strong navy and army; and also, as a second line of defence, a reserve of wheat.

Admiral Harding Close said on the same subject: "We spend 31 millions a year on the Navy. You might as well chuck that money into the sea for all the good it will do; for what is the use of going to sea and winning battles of Trafalgar if we leave a starving population behind? . . . It is no use your boasting that we have a powerful navy, and that, therefore, having command of the sea, our food supply is safe. You cannot get a naval officer to say so. We never had command of the sea, so far as the protection of our merchant ships is concerned. If there was a period in the history of this country when we might say we had command of the sea, surely it was after the battle of Trafalgar, when there was not an enemy left on the sea: yet after that battle hundreds of our merchant ships were captured, and it will be so again. We cannot protect our merchant ships; the thing is impossible. But I believe this also, that a blockade of our ports is impossible. The true blockade will be the impossibility of our ten thousand slow merchant ships obtaining any insurance and being laid up as useless, as the United States merchant ships were laid up when the Alabama was about. This will prevent the weekly arrival of the four hundred merchant ships which bring